Suggestions/help for 10g nano?

[BlueAbyss]

Originally Posted by matthewpunger

alright, I'll keep an eye on everything. I did add rock about 3 months ago that I was told was cured to help restock the organisms in it. After adding it, I realized that it hadn't been fully cured and would need to go through a cycle, but I had thought that the cycle would have completed by now though.
thanks,
Matt

See the problem with doing a 'hard' traditional cycle is this: you have ammonia (the start of the cycle) which if not reduced or removed fast enough will cause more die-off, which produces more ammonia, more die-off, etc. This can go on for months in some tanks, until the tank finally reaches an equilibrium. It is possible that this is what is happening in your tank, but regular testing is the only way to be sure.

If this is the case, I would continue doing heavy water changes and test daily (at least) so you know if you need to remove the livestock.... BUT....

You said your problems started in the fall... did it start for seemingly no reason? And hasn't improved at all? It's possible that the RO membrane in the big filter in the store is past it's useful life, and the store just hasn't noticed (or doesn't care). I would buy a TDS meter to see what it says, just to be safe. I'll bet your test of their 'pure' water will surprise you.

[Ron99]

Hi Snaz,

Where in Surrey do you get your water? Sorry to hijack the thread a bit...

Thanks,

Ron

[Snaz]

http://www.aquaibiza.com/
Cloverdale, so it might be a bit far for you.

If you prepay for 10 bottles it cost $2.00/bottle picked up.

[Ron99]

That's not to bad. Maybe a 15 or 20 minute drive and a big bottle should last me 2 weeks. Is it RO/DI water or just the standard Culligan RO with carbon filter? This could be a good option for those of us with nano tanks who don't really see the need to invest in our own RO/DI unit.

[Snaz]

Originally Posted by Ron99

That's not to bad. Maybe a 15 or 20 minute drive and a big bottle should last me 2 weeks. Is it RO/DI water or just the standard Culligan RO with carbon filter? This could be a good option for those of us with nano tanks who don't really see the need to invest in our own RO/DI unit.

Its a huge honking RO/DI setup. I go through 2 bottles in four weeks doing 12% water change weekly plus various rinsing and top ups.

[ElGuappo]

i would not recomend a rio nano skimmer. i hate mine. would just take half my water ,from the changes, from the top inch of the water thus removing the dirty water that can settle on top.

[matthewpunger]

Thanks for all the responses so far. So the Rio's no good eh? I was curious. Also, in response to blueabyss, I think you're right, it seemed to be the continuous cycle of die off, ammonia, die off. I've now actually decided against the protein skimmer. I've been changing the water a little bit almost everyday for a little while, I've taken my filter completely apart and scrubbed it. I think this was a large part of the problem. An enormous amount of junk came out of it (disgusting!), my flow more than doubled afterwards. I've also taken anything out my tank that might have been a problem - some further die off that I was hoping was still alive

I am hopeful now though - things are definitely clearing up and looking much better. Today my purple palys opened up for the first time in a couple of months, my brown palys are looking better, and my mushrooms are now getting fuller again.

For the time being, I think I will make this just a softie tank, no SPS for now; I've had terrible luck with it so far. I've been trying to keep my set-up really simple, I've done tons of reading, but lately the more I read the more I'm realizing that I'm not doing some things terribly optimally for this kind of tank. Before I relied on the LFS for my testing and relied almost completely on water changes to take care of everything else. I finally broke down and got some testing supplies, and stuff that will stabilize my PH and trace elements, and Chemi-pure filter media. I discovered that my PH was quite low - around 6, I think. I got it up to about 8 now.

Hopefully this will all help!

how does this sound to people? Am I on the right track?